People's Radical Party

The People's Radical Party was a conservative-liberal political party in Serbia and Yugoslavia that existed from 1881 to 1945. The party was founded by the youth followers of Svetozar Markovic and Nikola Pasic, and they called for change of constitution, freedom of the press, open politics, judicial independence, reform of the education system, and enhanced local self-government. In September 1883, the People's Radical Party launched a failed uprising against King Milan I of Serbia, and Pasic and several other rebel leaders were forced to flee into exile. In 1888, however, they were instrumental in the adoption of a new constitution, and, from 1891 until his 1926 death, Pasic was the dominant figure in Serbian politics, and his party shared this dominance of politics. The establishment of parliamentary democracy in the Principality of Serbia led to the Radicals abandoning their radicalism. Instead, they focused on nationalism and the creation of a "Greater Serbia", and they were strongly anti-Austria and pro-Russia and pro-France. In 1929, King Alexander I of Yugoslavia declared personal rule and banned the People's Radical Party and all other parties, and the party called for a return to parliamentary democracy and local self-government. In 1945, the party dissolved after the League of Communists of Yugoslavia seized power.